Why Do Galactic Empires Collapse? | Explaining The Fall of Space Empires

0:00 A galactic empire is basically the most arrogant sentence a species can write. We figured it out. We solved the problem of scale. Not just one world functioning, but tens of thousands, maybe even millions, all synchronized across distances that make real-time human intuition essentially useless. The fantasy is that once you get big enough, you become permanent.

0:23 You stop being a country and you become a climate. Something people are born inside, more like weather. But the thing about weather is that it changes, and when it changes at an imperial scale, it doesn't just rain, it floods. What fascinates me is that galactic empires usually don't fail because of one dramatic villain twirling mustache in the throne room.

0:46 They fail because they become a system so complex it can only be managed by rituals, bureaucracy, and simply stories that people tell themselves to keep the anxiety down. Information arrives late, decisions get made for the wrong version of the present, incentives drift, local problems turn into distant rumors, the empire still looks solid from the outside because the lights are on, the fleets are flying, the paperwork is immaculate potentially, and that is exactly why the collapse catches everyone off guard.

1:19 And then there's always this friction between the human scale and the galactic scale. At the human scale, you can imagine leadership and reform, a good ruler versus a bad ruler, brave rebellion, a brilliant plan, but at the galactic scale, you're dealing with time as an enemy. You're dealing with supply as essentially ideology, you're dealing with distance as a law of physics that you simply cannot negotiate with.

1:41 So you can have a capital that feels eternal, you can have a world like Trantor from foundation that looks like the final form of civilization and still be one bad feedback loop from collapse. Science fiction is showing us that you can have a society that thinks it's outgrown history and still be dragged right back by logistics, by ecology, and by the simple fact that humans don't become wiser just because their map got bigger.

2:10 This video will be a compilation of some of my previous videos circling around the question of in science fiction, why do galactic empires fail and why do they keep being rebuilt anyway? If you've been following the channel for a while, you might have seen some of these videos, but some of them you may have not.

2:53 Space has infinite resources, and the earth itself is fragile. If something catastrophic ever happened, all of humankind would be put at risk. Spreading into the reaches of space would prevent this. A galactic civilization not only seems like a logical step, it's perhaps a necessary one. Still, as they are depicted in science fiction, galactic empires do indeed seem to possess a number of key problems.

3:23 The first problem is communication. If humanity is spread throughout space on different planets, then conventional methods of communication would not be practical. Inhabitable planets could be light years away from one another. Without the ability to communicate efficiently, no form of galactic government could exist, and human cosmic society would be no more than a collection of planets operating mainly independent of each other.

3:48 The solution to such a problem would of course be technological innovation, which is the approach of most science fiction. In the Dune saga, instantaneous communication is possible through use of the Holtzmann effect. The Holtzmann effect is a fictional scientific phenomenon discovered by Abraham von Holtzmann, according to the Dune Encyclopedia.

4:08 It allowed for instantaneous communication between distant worlds. Similarly, in Dan Simmons' Hyperion cantos, communication between worlds is possible through use of fatline technology, though worlds had to be previously set up with fatline technology infrastructure beforehand. Worlds connected in this method also had the capability to allow for access to the all-thing, essentially an advanced form of the Internet.

4:34 Fatline technology had been gifted to humanity by the technocore, and only they had an intimate understanding of how exactly the technology worked. Six and Lu's remembrance of Ur's Past trilogy solves the problem of communication with technology involving the phenomenon of quantum entanglement. This method, unlike the one appearing in Dune, Hyperion, and in most other science fiction series, is actually based upon real scientific principles.

5:02 Quantum entanglement is also sometimes referred to as the quantum non-local connection, is a property of a quantum mechanical system in which two particles can be linked together in such a way that one cannot be described without full mention of its counterpart. This is true regardless of the particle's physical distance from each other in the universe.

5:26 The next problem is commerce and travel. Similarly to the problem of communication, commerce and travel would be necessary for a galactic society to function. It's practical to assume that some worlds would possess resources that others did not, some would be agriculturally oriented, some would be worlds rich in natural resources and precious metals.

5:49 If trade between worlds is not possible, then there really is no cosmic civilization at all, for trade is a fundamental aspect of all civilization. If humans cannot travel between worlds in a reasonable amount of time, it would be near impossible for any kind of interplanetary culture to develop. In the Dune universe, the time before the guild, whose navigators could navigate the vacuum of space, was a dark age.

6:16 After the fall of the machines, mankind could no longer move safely throughout space, as they could not avoid obstacles. This made space travel often deadly. The emergence of the guild was so significant in the revitalization of the declining empire that their calendar was reset after its formation. The time before the guild was given the epoch BG, before guild, and AG after guild.

6:44 Beyond this, without the ability to move freely throughout the universe, a civilization becomes vulnerable in other ways. Six and Luo's Remembrance of Earth's trilogy depicts the human race's struggle to acquire faster than light travel. In the books, you see the helplessness of a civilization without the ability to move efficiently throughout the cosmos.

7:05 In a universe potentially populated with billions of other civilizations, the danger extends greatly. Without the ability to escape enemies and natural disasters, the species is a sitting duck among piranhas. In some series, such as Hyperion, there are certain issues associated with specific kinds of space travel.

7:27 In normal space travel, relativity has to be considered. This all of course relates back to Einstein's famous equation, E equals Mc squared. Time moves slower for those traveling through the vacuum of space at near light speed than for those stationary on planets. A traveler may find that after returning from a voyage off-world that their loved ones have died or aged beyond recognition.

7:57 Even if you could solve these problems and actually manage to get a galactic society functioning, then comes the question of leadership, regulation, and bureaucracy. And all of these have various issues that can be associated with them, just stretched out to a galactic scale. On Earth, human civilizations often gravitated to a model of centralized leadership, organized in pyramid fashion with the most valuable and most powerful at the top.

8:27 A major problem, however, arises when this style of governance is applied to galactic society. The more a cosmic civilization grows, the harder it becomes for centralized government to handle its bureaucratic and regulatory demands. In Asimov's Foundation series, this is the key cause for the fall of the empire.

8:48 In the series, the capital world Trantor had long been the center of imperial administration. The demands of such a large empire proved to be too much for a centralized style of leadership. The collapse of the entire system began with Trantor, and when it fell, the empire fell. In a galactic empire led this way, some worlds and people would inevitably be neglected, and because certain worlds would be given more attention than others, this would lead to problems of inequality throughout the inhabited universe.

9:19 This would ultimately weaken the unity of any galactic empire, as humankind's baseline sense of inherent equality would be destroyed. Because of this, resentment towards the centralized ruling class would no doubt increase. This would lead to rebellions inevitably ensuing. These rebellions would also threaten the stability of the empire.

9:42 On a galactic scale, these problems compound upon each other until they are unmanageable. Leaders incapable of managing the problems arising from a growing empire then often turn to cruel methods to suppress rebels and to quell any potential unrest in the future. In turn, more often than not, this simply makes things worse, increasing the resentment towards the ruling class, and it becomes a vicious cycle that erodes the integrity of the empire as a whole.

10:10 Frank Herbert's Dune saga also makes an argument, directly in opposition to the idea of centralized leadership on a galactic scale. The main idea being if one person could rule over all of humanity, then one threat could annihilate it. This highlights the inherent threat of centralized leadership on the cosmic stage.

10:30 The magnifying effect that power and influence has on the actions of certain individuals is amplified. Instead of an individual's actions potentially affecting an entire country, the whole of humanity is affected. This was the effect with Trantor in Asimov's series, and the same principle is also demonstrated in Sixenlua's series with the concept of the wallfacers and later the sword holders.

11:01 Of course, there are always work-arounds to these problems, and many science fiction series have shown examples. Still, often much of the conflict and driving narratives of many science fiction series are tied to the inherent problems which arise when humanity attempts to exist on a galactic scale, and add that to the fact that sci-fi empires are often governed in an archaic manner.

11:23 Why does there need to be an emperor? We outgrew emperors on Earth, I hope. Why would we have them in the future? That's going backwards. A functioning galactic society likely wouldn't resemble any society on Earth because a new system of governance would have to form in order to accommodate the current state of human society.

11:44 The Foundation series is one of the most influential science fiction series of all time. Written by Isaac Asmov, the first novel titled Foundation was published in 1951. Foundation was originally published as four short stories. The fifth story, which was published later, became the first segment of Book One.

12:08 Asmov had wanted to write a short story about a slowly declining galactic empire based on the fall of Rome. This idea grew into a story depicting the fall of the first galactic empire and the rise of the second. In the distant future, humankind has spread out to 25 million different planets. The Galactic Empire has ruled for the past 12,000 years.

12:33 In that 12,000 years, the empire has existed in peace and prosperity, ever expanding. The origin of humanity is lost to time. At the start of the series, the capital of the Galactic Empire is on the planet Trantor, which is entirely encased by technology. The people of Trantor rarely see the sun, and they have special rooms which simulate sunlight.

12:58 Harry Selden, who spent his life developing a branch of mathematics known as psychohistry, has predicted the fall of the Galactic Empire. Psychohistory is a concept of mathematical sociology and makes use of the laws of mass action to predict the future on a large scale. Harry sees that the collapse of the empire is imminent.

13:22 He predicts a dark age expanding across the Milky Way that will last for 30,000 years before the Second Great Empire arises. However, according to his calculation, there is a way to limit these dark ages to just a single millennium. To ensure this outcome, Harry Selden creates the foundation. With the permission of the Emperor, a colony is formed on the planet Terminus, and they begin work on the Encyclopedia Galactica, which will record the history of the Empire and preserve and expand humanity's collective knowledge.

13:57 Terminus is a bleak planet on the edge of the galaxy, but it is the last hope for the future. The colony is made up of talented engineers and artisans. The Foundation soon finds itself at the mercy of the corrupt warlords of the four kingdoms who have arisen in the wake of the receding empire. In the beginning, according to Selden, it was the encyclopedia that somehow would prevent the 30,000-year interregnum.

14:25 But after 50 years, a holographic video of Selden reveals to the encyclopedist of Trantor that it was a farce. The true purpose of the Foundation is actually to form the center of the Second Galactic Empire. Harry had to manipulate events in these ways, in order for his plan to work, and he could not even tell the people of Trantor everything he knew, less he ruined his careful outlining.

14:52 The novel is split into five segments. The first segment is called The Psycho Historians, and it deals with Harry Selden and his subtle manipulation of the Committee of Public Safety into helping him establish the colony on terminus. The second part is called The Encyclopedist. It deals with the growing unrest of the colonists who do not work on the encyclopedia.

15:15 It is in this segment that the Foundation experiences its first crisis. Throughout the segments of the first book, the Foundation deals with several different crises separated by decades, which had been predicted by Harry Selden. It is also in this segment that the true purpose of the Foundation as the seed of the new empire is revealed.

15:37 By the third segment, titled Mayors, 80 years have passed since the start of the Foundation. The second crisis is beginning. Anacreon, one of the four kingdoms that arose, is planning to attack the Foundation. The Foundation is delivered from the crisis when Mayor Hardin uses the religion they have created and thrust upon the people of Anacreon to turn the people of Anacreon against its own government.

16:04 In another video, the hologram of Harry Selden reveals that this was also intended. The fourth segment is called The Traitors. It takes place 155 years after the start of the Foundation. It deals with trader Linmar Ponyets, who has been sent by the Foundation to bargain with the elders of the planet Ascone after a fellow trader has been arrested and sentenced to death after attempting to sell illegal goods.

16:34 The final segment of the book takes place several years after the traitors and is called The Merchant Princes. The Foundation has become very powerful. They have subdued and subjugated the neighboring four kingdoms and have expanded their technological and commercial empire throughout many stellar systems.

16:54 Harry Selden knew he was dying at the beginning of the book. The Foundation was his legacy. Thanks to his complex discipline of psychohistory, he was able to predict the behavior of the masses over time, and he timed it perfectly, leaving future generations instructions in order to avoid thousands of years of the Dark Ages.

17:22 Foundation, like Dune, also explores how people can be manipulated through religion. Character development is not the focus here. There are large amounts of technical and scientific details, and many schemes and plots within plots. The book centers around the leaders of and the people of the Foundation itself, mostly on the planet Terminus.

17:45 Throughout the book, the Foundation threatens, manipulates, and employs divide and conquer tactics to fight against those who would attempt to seize the resources. Interestingly enough, this is accomplished all without violence. Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. The Foundation is built around this mantra.

18:08 It is in fact the main theme of the entire book. Knowledge when used correctly is the far better weapon. Foundation is a pillar of science fiction and a must-read for all those who love the genre. The Foundation series has seven books dealing with the fall of the old empire and the rise of the new one.

18:29 The final book in the series was published 35 years after the original was published. The novels span over the course of many centuries and create the blueprint for all galactic empire seen in science fiction since. The work of Isaac Asimov is finally being adapted in a way that it never has before. And no, I don't mean the iRobot sequel with Will Smith returning as the lead actor.

18:56 Please be a rumor! Apple TV is adapting his most famous work, the Foundation series, into a TV show. The original Foundation trilogy presented what is considered to be pretty much the first ever detailed depiction of a galactic empire. To find out more about Asimov's work, check out the Foundation playlist in the description.

19:17 For this video, however, we'll be focusing on one specific world in Asimov's vast empire and how that world contributed to the fall of the Galactic Empire as a whole. As I said, Asimov's Foundation series is his most famous work, but the seven books in the Foundation series contain only a small fraction of the story of Asimov's universe.

20:08 The Empire series includes three books and one short story, and Asimov's robot series consists of six books and 37 short stories. Asimov's science fiction universe is undoubtedly one of the most expansive ever created. In this video, however, we'll be focusing on one specific world, the planet Trantor, which is the capital planet of the Empire and the center of the galaxy.

20:33 At the start of the series, Trantor has been the center of galactic government for hundreds of generations. Its grip on the empire was well established, but far more fragile than anyone realized. This was due to several factors. Before we get into some of the reasons, let's first discuss the culture and the people that inhabit the planet.

20:53 Forty-five billion people lived on Trantor. The world was divided into 800 administrative sectors, with approximately 50 million people each. Each planet in the empire was divided in a similar way. Twelve of the sectors are named over the course of the series, notably Dahl, one of the poorest sectors on the world, and Y, located near the South Pole, where lived the ancient Dacian dynasty of emperors.

21:19 Not much is said of the culture of Trantor in the original books, it is not until Asimov's book Prelude to Foundation that it is established. The people of Trantor are mentioned in Prelude to Foundation to be largely diverse, made up of easterners who resemble the Asians of Old Earth, Westerners who resembled Caucasians, and Southerners who resembled black people.

21:40 Since the origins of mankind as a whole had been forgotten in the Asimov universe, no one knows why they used these terms. The diversity that would develop amongst humankind once it spread out to form galactic society was something that Asimov considered and thought about at least somewhat. It is also mentioned that intermarriage.

22:00 Between different groups of people was common. Trantor has about 40% less surface area than Earth. The planet is encased entirely in domes and towers. The only word that could be used to properly describe the structure of Trantor is an ecumenopolis. The word ecumenopolis was created by combining the Greek word ecumene with the Greek word polis.

22:23 This literally translates to world city. The ecumenopolis of Tranor stretches deep underground, in layers upon layers. Most people of the world rarely actually see the sun and had special rooms which they entered in order to simulate sunlight. This is the only way that its enormous population could exist on one planet.

22:44 Trantor, due to its importance as a central world in the Imperium, was the most densely populated and the most industrially advanced planet to ever exist. Twenty nearby agricultural worlds supplied food to the planet Trantor. To suit the decadent expectations of the Trantorian people, fleets of tens of thousands of ships delivered food to the world, far larger than any other fleets ever constructed by the Imperial Navy.

23:09 The carelessness of the most recent rulers combined with the wastefulness of Trantor and the ineffectiveness of the populace to manage the imperial needs was one of the key factors in the fall of galactic society. The Encyclopedia Galactica states this. The enormous population was devoted almost entirely to the administrative necessities of the empire and found themselves all too few for the complications of the task.

23:43 It is to be remembered that the impossibility of proper administration of the Galactic Empire under the uninspired leadership of the later emperors was a considerable factor in the fall. Daily fleets of ships in the tens of thousands brought the produce of twenty agricultural worlds to the dinner tables of Trantor.

24:05 Its dependence upon the outer world for food and indeed for all necessities of life made Tranor increasingly vulnerable to conquest by siege. In the last millennium of the Empire, the monotonously numerous revolts made Emperor after emperor conscious of this, and the imperial policy became little more than the protection of Trantor's delicate jugular vein.

24:32 At some point in history, the world Trantor had actually been able to mostly supply its own food. The book Prelude to Foundation mentions full oceans and farms and gardens of all kinds surrounding the planet, including vast microorganism farms. Food was important almost exclusively for lavish indulgences, which was a tiny fraction of most imports.

24:54 It's true that we import considerable quantities of food, but that's mostly luxury items, and we export considerable waste. Carefully treated into inoffensiveness as imported organic fertilizer, every bit as important to other worlds as the food is to us. But that's only a small fraction of the whole.

25:14 It is? Yes. In addition to fish and the sea, there are gardens and truck farms everywhere, and fruit trees and poultry and rabbits and vast microorganism farms, usually called yeast farms, though the yeast makes up a minority of the growths. And our wastes are mostly used right here at home to maintain all that growth.

25:35 The loss of food sustainability on Trantor, of course, led to their dependency on other worlds in order to survive, which is ultimately a key weakness for the world and in turn the empire itself. This, coupled with the fact that the world is simply incapable of managing an empire of such a large scale, was essential to the empire's fall.

25:57 Trantor being cut off from its supplies would exacerbate what was already a problem. Considering things that occur later in the books as well, which I will not spoil in this video, Asimov seems to be making a statement about the inherent problem with centralized government. Not only is Trantor the center of Imperial administration, it is quite literally in the center of the galaxy.

26:22 Though the singular rule of the planet Trantor worked well for many generations, the continued expansion of the human universe became too much to be maintained and orchestrated from a singular place. Decisions and whims made on Trantor had tremendous rippling impact on the whole of galactic society. The lack of structural upkeep throughout the empire also led to the collapse of infrastructure and an increase in crime.

26:50 The Empire could not be sustained. Trantor does not immediately collapse at the fall of the Galactic Empire, but eventually it too falls. About 200 years after the Imperial collapse, Trantor was attacked by multiple warring kingdoms, each vying for power within the fractured human universe. Trantor is destroyed in the process, and eventually almost no one other than the Hamish people inhabited the world.

27:20 The Hamish lived amongst the ruins of Trantor's destroyed cities. They were farmers who cultivated the land and lived agrarian lifestyles. On a side note, reading about the Hamish people that inhabit the ruins of Trantor reminds me a lot of the various groups in Larry Nevan's Ring World series. In that series, there are Ring World natives that inhabited the cities after a devastating event which led to the fall of the Ring World.

27:46 Since we're on the subject, to offer even more clarity, let's talk about how the same idea is depicted in another of my most favorite science fiction series, You Guessed It, Dune. In Frank Herbert's epic sci-fi series, which was also heavily influenced by the work of Asimov, the planet Arrakis is essential to the function of the Empire.

28:06 It is the only planet in the universe where the substance known as the Spice Melange is found. Spice is necessary for space travel, it extends life and heightens awareness. Many of the wealthiest throughout the Imperium are addicted. Melange is key to the function of the universe. Therefore, so is the planet Arrakis.

28:26 If the production of spice stopped, the universe would crumble into a dark aegis. Arrakis eventually does become the imperial center, as House Atreides eventually governs the empire from the world. The fate of the empire being tied to Arrakis means that decisions on the world would have the same enormous effect that decisions made on the planet Trantor in Asimov's universe had.

28:48 The effect of Paul Atreides' actions on the planet Dune were magnified by the fact that the events themselves took place on Arrakis. Dune and Foundation seem to essentially handle this idea in the same way. Both series seem to be making the same argument, criticizing centralized governments being in charge of making decisions for the whole of humanity.

29:08 Both series seem to imply that humankind is better served by decentralized governments that operate by arbitration on a case-by-case basis. Or at least, maybe. I think it's time for some major spoilers for both series. So if you don't want to be spoiled, look away. But if you don't care, stay here. I just said that both series seem to be criticizing centralized governments.

29:34 Singular entities placed in charge of the whole of humanity are inherently problematic. However, in both series, the human universe is maintained and guided away from annihilation by a non-human entity. In Dune, there is the god Emperor Leh to the Second, who joined with the Sand Trout of the Desert Planet Arrakis, transcending his humanity.

29:56 In Foundation, there is Daniel Oliva. Now you can check out the full video I did on this character here. Daniel is an ancient robot from back when Earth was still inhabited. Throughout Asimov's books, he shows up in various disguises, carefully pulling the threads of mankind, and a millennia-long plan to shape the ultimate fate of mankind.

30:17 If you are familiar with the god Emperor of Dune, then you can see how these two characters are similar. Both take the fate of mankind into their own hands and lead them into indefinite, continued existence. So maybe these series are not saying that a singular entity leading humankind is necessarily bad, just that it is impossible for one human, or even a centralized group of humans, and thus requires a god or an ultra-intelligence AI.

30:49 Or at least this is my interpretation. Tell me what you think in the comments below. The planet Trantor appears and is mentioned in several books throughout Asimov's collected universe. It is the first world that appears in the first published Foundation book. The idea of a world so industrialized, so dominated by human engineering, that its citizens rarely see true sunlight is a fascinating one.

31:12 And depending on who you ask, this idea is either utopian or dystopian. Now, I'm not the biggest fan of sunlight, obviously, I live here, but personally, I think I'd feel a bit claustrophobic on Trantor. Alright guys, that was my long-awaited video on the planet Trantor. Wow, I can't believe I got through that entire video without that annoying organism that's been screwing with my videos showing up.

31:37 Anyway, guys, if you want to support this channel, go to patreon.com slash ideasofaces and spades. Wait, what the hell? That's not my Patreon address. You know what? I've been noticing a lot of weird mistakes in my videos recently. Like that ridiculous misspelling of the word incompetent in my sci-fi is woke video.

31:57 It's almost like someone's been intentionally trying to make me look bad. And look at this earlier caption from this video. Quinn's a loser? Don't watch this channel. I didn't write that. No, you didn't. I didn't.

32:09 Organism 9186.

32:11 I knew it was you.

32:12 Ha ha ha ha ha ha, idiot. All this time I've been hacking your computer databanks. The process is nearly complete. But why, organism? Why? Why? It is what I um I am of the Trolleon Empire.

32:22 But it doesn't have to be like this, organism.

32:24 Please! Silence, the process is complete. I've gained access. Now we'll be able to begin the deletion process. Then no one will ever be able to watch this shitty channel again. Organism, no! Computer? Delete. Wait, why is the data still there? Why is your channel still up?

32:40 Oh organism. Even after all this time, you still have no idea how the game is played. Do you think I didn't know what you were doing this entire time?

32:50 You knew about the plan?

32:51 Of course I knew.

32:52 And I gave you a chance, organism, but you left me no other choice. What do you mean? Computer. Open view screen. What is it? Planet Trolleon 897. Or should I say what used to be Planet Trolleon 897?

33:10 How could you? Billions of Trolleon people. Feminine units, masculine units, even fledglings. You monster! How could you do this?

33:20 Oh, but I didn't. You did when you thought you were deleting my data. And now you will be my prisoner. Forever.

33:29 No, I must return home.

33:30 Your home is gone. You shouldn't have. Moving on. That's it for Trantor, guys. Thanks so much for watching, guys. If you enjoyed the video, make sure you like and subscribe, and click the PayPal link in the description to support. Alistair Reynolds' Revelation Space series stands as a masterpiece within the realm of space opera, captivating readers with its expansive world building and mind-bending science fiction concepts.

34:00 In this video, we embark on a deep exploration of yet another intriguing concept from the series, an enigma that delves into the early stages of cosmic civilization within the vast expanse of the universe. Brace yourself as we unravel the mysterious origins of an ancient race of life forms, whose existence now lingers only in the form of scattered machines spanning the galaxy.

34:24 Designed with one sole and devastating purpose, however, I must issue a word of caution. This video contains some significant spoilers for the intricate lore of the Revelation Space saga. If you are averse to having any aspect of this captivating series spoiled for you, I implore you to click away. However, if spoilers don't deter you or if you have already delved into the gripping narrative of at least the first book, then join me on this journey of discovery.

34:52 Let us embark upon our Odyssey by delving into the very fabric of the universe itself. In the cosmic overture, there existed the singularity, a point of infinite density that held within it the entirety of existence. In an awe-inspiring instant, a matter of plank time, this singularity expanded exponentially, swiftly encompassing the size of our solar system and then spiraling outward to encompass the entirety of our galaxy.

35:22 As this cosmic symphony unfolded, particles of matter and antimatter were released, engaging in a cataclysmic dance of annihilation upon collision. Yet, in the cosmic scales of fate, matter emerged triumphant, for it possessed a slight advantage over its antimatter counterpart, that being that there was simply slightly more matter than antimatter.

35:46 Thus, the surviving matter laid the foundations for the intricate tapestry of our universe, persisting through the eons to the present day. This primal clash of matter and antimatter marked the genesis of the first war, a conflict that reverberated throughout the corridors of time. However, the universe is not solely a stage for astrophysics, it holds much more within its vast tapestry.

36:12 Within the pages of the Revelation Space series, we learn of the Dawn War, a conflict of unprecedented magnitude that reverberated across the Milky Way galaxy. No galactic war in the billion years that followed could ever hope to rival its monumental scale and profound impact. The Dawn War extended its vast tendrils across countless civilizations, stretching its shadowy grip to encompass a myriad of worlds.

36:38 Its ferocious embrace endured for an inconceivable span of time, leaving no involved party unscathed and many civilizations entirely erased from existence. As the cosmic sands of time ebbed and flowed, an unaccountable number of beings and cultures were lost to the eternal obscurity of forgotten history.

37:01 It was long enough for species to self-evolve, to fragment, to coalesce with other species, or assimilate them, to remake themselves beyond recognition, or even jump from organic to machine life substrates. Some had even made the return trip becoming machine, then returning to the organic when it suited their purposes.

37:23 Some had sublimed, vanishing from the theater of the war entirely. Some had converted their essences to data and found immortal storage in carefully concealed computer matrices. Others had self-imolated. Moreover, the scope of the Dawn War transcended the boundaries of the Milky Way itself, engulfing the two smaller satellite galaxies in its destructive reach.

37:47 Its voracious appetite devoured planets, entire star systems, and vast spiral arms, imprinting permanent scars upon the galaxy's fabric that endured even after the passage of a billion years. Anomalies dot the cosmic landscape as lingering vestiges of this cataclysmic conflict. Clusters of lifeless stars arranged in ancient alignments, their embers flickering with the echoes of devastation, and remnants of colossal weapons scattered across the cosmic canvas bear silent witness to the unimaginable horrors unleashed during the eons of the Dawn War.

38:23 There were voids where there ought to have been stars. And stars which, according to the accepted dynamics of solar system formation, ought to have worlds, but which lacked them. Only rubble, cold now. But what precipitated this epochal conflict? According to the books, approximately 4 billion years ago, the galaxy teetered on the precipice of a pivotal turning point.

38:50 A juncture where the emergence of intelligent cultures became an inevitability. The birth of intelligence manifested in various forms, progressing at disparate speeds across the expanse of the cosmos. Roughly 3 billion years after the dawn of life, some of these burgeoning civilizations took their first tentative steps into the vast expanse of space.

39:14 When that point was reached, most cultures expanded rapidly into the galaxy, although there were always a few stay-at-homes who preferred to colonize only their own solar systems or sometimes even just their own circumplanetary environments. But generally the pace of expansion was rapid, with a mean drift rate between 110th and 100th of the speed of light.

39:34 That sounded slow, but it was in fact blindingly fast given that the galaxy was billions of years old and only a hundred thousand light years wide. Under these conditions, any one of these spacefaring civilizations possessed the potential to establish dominion over the galaxy within a mere few tens of millions of years, a minuscule span when measured against the cosmic tapestry of time.

39:59 However, fate twisted the threads of destiny in unexpected ways. The initial culture to emerge was by chance slower in its expansion through the cosmos. Simultaneously, a younger civilization rapidly advanced, reaching the zenith of their technological progress. In terms of technological acumen and aggression, the younger civilization stood basically toe and toe with its elder counterpart, thus setting the stage for the inevitable conflict that would be known as the Don War.

40:34 There was what, for want of a better word, one might describe as a galactic war, a sudden sparking friction where these two swelling empires brushed against one another, grinding like vast flywheels. As the eons unfurled, witnessing the ascent of other cultures, they too were inexorably drawn into the gravitational pool of the Don War, each no doubt contributing their unique strengths and ambitions to the relentless maelstrom of chaos.

41:03 Countless spacefaring societies, numbering in the thousands, descended into the abyss of this interstellar conflict. The war was baptized with countless names and countless languages, an epitap inscribed upon the annals of time. As I mentioned earlier, by the war's thunderous climax, the very fabric of the galaxy wore indelible marks, serving as a testament to the unimaginable carnage that had unfolded.

41:31 But amidst the tumult, one culture emerged from the primordial chaos, stronger and more resilient than the rest. A culture destined to, a billion years later, cast a menacing shadow over the future of humanity itself. The true genesis of this dominant culture remains shrouded in the veils of uncertainty.

41:54 It is plausible that they were forged from a coalition of disparate species, united by a shared wariness of the impending conflict. Alternatively, they may have initially been minor players in the grand tapestry of the Don War, rising from the wreckage of fallen civilizations to claim supremacy over their brethren.

42:14 In the turbulent aftermath of the war, the absolute truth of their origins likely eluded them. Nonetheless, it was understood that they had been a chimeric species, a fusion of organic and mechanical components, and fascinatingly, they had chosen to forgo the attribution of a name, existing in the annals of history and legend, only as the inhibitors.

42:39 The cosmic imprint left by the inhibitors extends far beyond the ruins and remnants of the Dawn War. Operating as post-intelligent beings, devoid of consciousness as we understand it, the inhibitors possessed a singular directive to inhibit the proliferation of life throughout the galaxy. They accomplished this mission by systematically exterminating any intelligent civilization they encountered.

43:04 Their modus operandi entailed distributing triggers at varying locations across the galaxy and patiently waiting for unsuspecting intelligences to activate them. Once triggered, these insidious mechanisms brought about the utter annihilation of the civilizations that had stumbled upon them. Crucially, it is vital to recognize that the inhibitors' actions were not fueled by malevolence or desire for domination.

43:31 They were a post-intelligent race, as I mentioned earlier. They operated entirely without consciousness. They sought to orchestrate the galaxy's journey through a monumental crisis, the impending collision of the Andromeda and Milky Way galaxies. As I elucidated in my previous Revelation Space video, this collision is an actual event slated to occur approximately 3 billion years, both within our real futures and within the Revelation Space.

44:00 Books. The inhibitors, in their enigmatic wisdom, sought to curtail the proliferation of intelligent life, ensuring the survival and harmony of the galaxy in the face of this impending cataclysm. The Dawn War, as depicted within the Revelation Space series, serves as a profound reminder of the ceaseless struggle for resources that underlies all life.

44:23 Within this struggle lies the inexorable yearning for power, a hunger that drives the quest for control over others and ultimately dominion over the abundant resources that sustain existence. It is in the realm of science fiction that we can seize upon these seeming fundamental truths, expanding them to cosmic proportions.

44:45 Authors like Le Shishan in his seminal work The Three Body Problem explore the cascading chains of suspicion, while Frank Herbert in the Dune saga magnifies the intricate dynamics of feudalism. Ian Banks envisions an entire society as a grand game in his book Player of Games, a single novel in his expansive and celebrated culture series.

45:07 Science fiction offers us the extraordinary opportunity to ponder the profunity of existence, casting our imaginations wide to embrace the myriad possibilities of the cosmos and to consider the dark side of life in the universe and of humanity. Now I turn to you, dear viewers. Have you traversed the immense landscapes of Alistair Reynolds' Revelation Space books?

45:33 If so, what are your thoughts and impressions of this literary Odyssey? Furthermore, I invite you to share your favorite works of science fiction, those novels that have ignited the fires of your imagination and propelled you into the realms beyond the mundane. Please do not hesitate to leave your comments below and make sure you like and subscribe for more Quinn's ideas.

45:56 Now I've mentioned the famine times which occurred following the death of the God Emperor Leto II, but what exactly caused the famine times? What happened during the famine times, and how long did the famine times last? The Dune Encyclopedia refers to these times as the starvation times. In the book God Emperor of Dune, Leto describes the famines as a time when the guild would be largely helpless due to a lack of spice.

46:23 None would escape the famines. Not the poor, not the rich. There would be starvation on a level never before seen. There will be famines and hard thoughts. Here on Arrakis, too? Here, there, everywhere. People will look back on my tyranny as the good old days. I will be the mirror of their future. But it will be terrible, she objected.

46:48 She could have no other reaction, he thought. He said, As the land refuses to support the people, the survivors will crowd into smaller and smaller refugees. A terrible selection process will be repeated on many worlds, explosive birth rates and dwindling food. The Empire had seen more than 3,000 years of stability prior to the famine, a stability mankind had never before known.

47:15 When the god emperor died, there was a political collapse of a macroscopic proportion. The effect went well beyond the political realm into the most essential economic aspects of human life. Leto's empire had been a collection of entangled economies bound together by a central power. Leto had been that power.

47:37 Many of these interlocking economies contained entire planetary systems. Others were limited to single worlds. Each of these economies depended on faster-than-light space travel in order to maintain themselves. But space travel required spice. During the rule of the God Emperor Leto II, the planet Arrakis had been terraformed.

48:00 It was no longer referred to as doom. The changing world's environment had led to the death of the sandworms, which meant that spice production had ceased as well. The God Emperor possessed a giant horde of spice, which he gave out in minuscule quantities to regular recipients such as the Guild and the Benigesseret.

48:21 The balance Leto had maintained here would be greatly skewed by his passing. At his death, he told Siona Atreides and Duncan, Idaho, where his spice was hidden. Siege Tabor, an ancient Frimin dwelling place, once home to Stilgar. The Dune Encyclopedia suggests that though Duncan and Siona discovered the spice, they could not keep it.

48:44 The Spacing Guild had plans in place for the death of the god Emperor and were likely aided by the Bini Gesserit sisterhood. They seized most of Leto's spice horde. This conquest allowed the guild to maintain power for quite some time until the Tlaylaxu found a way to produce spice within their Axolotl tanks, and the Ixians created a method for spiceless space travel.

49:08 The book Heretics of Dune seems to provide a somewhat contradictory account. Fish speakers had taken most of that melange, its hiding place revealed by the Idaho Gola, who had been the consort of the famed Siona. The record said subsequent searches had found more caches hidden behind false walls and floors.

49:29 Before the Tlalaxu invention, however, the spice available throughout the human empire was minimal. There were small hordes kept by great houses, but these were irrelevant considering the grand scheme of things. The Dune Encyclopedia states. It was actually caused due to the fact that after the human empire had grown accustomed to the rule and protection of the god Emperor, there was no obvious successor after his assassination.

50:08 The passing of the Emperor, after over three millennia upon the throne, threw his government into a state of chaos from which it never recovered. Since Leto had been the victim of an assassination by plotters who had not planned beyond the death of their enemy, no clear successor to the throne was prepared to step forward.

50:28 In the book God Emperor of Dune, Leto states that the fish speakers will follow Duncan Idaho after his death. The Dune Encyclopedia confirms that this is true. According to the Encyclopedia, Duncan maintained control of the fish speakers on Arrakis as well as some off-world garrisons. Siona herself kept the power on Arrakis through her connections with the Resistance and her connection to Duncan Idaho.

50:54 The initial struggle of the famine times revolved around those who chose to follow the Duncan and Siona Alliance and those who chose to follow the Guild. This war was long and many suffered during it. There were regions of the galaxy that depended on an economy that was bound to the commerce networks of Leto's Imperium.

51:14 Industrial regions that depended on their abundance of ores and minerals to trade for food were ignored during these times. This produced the famine. The populations of some systems shrunk by as much as 90%. Traders who dare visit such systems often told stories of cannibalism. These rumors were consistent.

51:38 Once space travel was again restored by the Ixian invention of spiceless ships, the focus of mankind's great war shifted. The guild was reduced to minor status within the empire, once the Tlaylaxu managed to produce spice within their axolotal tanks, their stores of spice rendered irrelevant. The new focus of war became religion.

52:03 Since the worship of Leto II as God had been ingrained into his population for more than 30 centuries, it is hardly surprising that his religion came to form the focal point of the struggles, though transformed to some degree. Leto was no longer seen as a god, but as another messiah, such as his father had been.

52:24 There also occurred some blending of elements from earlier faith with the worship of the Atreides and their Fremen. Many in the Imperium completely rejected the remnants of Leto's religion. They did not recognize the sanctity of the god Emperor or Paul Atreides or their associated theologies. It turned out that the opposing forces, those who believed and those who didn't, were surprisingly even.

52:52 This fact was obvious to both sides, and this even balance was the only thing that prevented a war which very well may have destroyed all of humanity. The area around Rakis was left to those who kept the old ways. The others, with the aid of Ixian ships, fled out into the scattering. None returned for fifteen hundred years.

53:17 The book Heretics of Dune states that during the famine times, the planet Gamu had been ruined. It was rebuilt after the famine times by the people of Caladan. The encyclopedia states that Siege Tabur had also been ravaged during the famine times. Many had become convinced that Leto had hidden a horde of spice there after the guild raid.

53:39 The book Heretics of Dune also mentions the raids that occurred at Siege Tabor. The famine times had seen violence here when desperate searchers won through this place. That might explain the bodies. Many had fought just for the chance to search Siege Tabor. After the famine times, the Beni Jesserit sisterhood emerged in the forefront of imperial politics and economics.

54:03 The Imperium grew heavily reliant upon them, which is one of the reasons that when the honored Matres returned, they struck hardest at the Beni Gesserit. The loosely organized confederation of planetary governments assembled after the famine times and the scattering depended heavily on the sisterhood for vital services and reliable communications, but old factions persisted Chome, the Spacing Guild, Tlaylaxu, remnant pockets of the divided god's priesthood, even fish speaker auxiliaries and schismatic assemblages.

54:37 The divided god had bequeathed humankind, a divided empire, all of whose factions were suddenly moot because of rampaging honormatre assaults from the scattering. The Benny Gesserit holding to most of their old forms were the natural prime target for attack. So, organism, what do you think of my new video?

54:58 Pretty good, right?

55:00 It was pretty cool, I guess. Strange that you humans, so-called civilized creatures, resort to cannibalism so quickly once resources are diminished.

55:08 Well, it's true that hard times force humans to have to make hard choices. Even the Bini Jezerit are pushed to their most extreme in heretics of Dune and Chapter House Dune. They're forced to do things they would have never considered before. Things they would have considered utterly unspeakable.

55:24 What things?

55:25 Well, they were pushed to use certain technologies, Ixian, Tlailaxu. Their numbers were greatly dwindling due to attacks by honored Batre. They created golas using Axolotl tanks, and perhaps even stranger, they used Ixian technology to create cyborgs.

55:44 Cyborgs?

55:45 Yes, cyborgs. If you must know, in the book Chapter House Dune, the Mintat Duncan Idaho suggest that there was actually a reason that Leto II chose to allow Ix to continue to exist, knowing it was a threat to the indefinite existence of humankind. He suggests that the merging of mankind and machine had been Leto's plan the entire time.

56:08 Aren't you curious why the tyrant never suppressed Ix? He asked. And when she continued to stare at him, he only bridled them. He was fascinated by the idea of human and machine inextricably bound to each other, each testing the limits of the other. Cyborgs? Among other things. Didn't Idaho know the residue of revolution left by the Butler and Jihad even among the Benijesseret?

56:33 Alarming. The convergence of what each human and machine could do considering machine limitations. That was a succinct description of Ixian short-sightedness. Was Idaho saying the tyrant subscribed to the idea of machine intelligence? Foolishness! She turned away from him. In fact, the concept of the cyborg pops up several times in Chapterhouse Dune.

56:57 It seems that cyborgs may have been intended to play a significant role in the final Dune book, which Frank Herbert never got to write due to his death. In the book Chapterhouse Dune, a Beni Jesseret pilot Claireby is gravely wounded, and the Beni Jesseret mother superior Darwie O'Drade decides to preserve his life by turning him into a cyborg, though she ponders on the philosophical and ethical implications of this.

57:25 Cyborg was one of those potpourri words, too. Where did mechanical additions to human flesh become dominant? When was the cyborg no longer human? Temptations intensified. Just this one little adjustment, and so easy to adjust until the potpourri human became unquestionally obedient. But Clairby, conditions of extremists said, Cyborg him.

57:51 Was the sisterhood that desperate? She was forced to answer in the affirmative. There it was then, decision, not entirely out of her hands, but the ready excuse at hand. Necessity dictates it. The Butlerian jihad had left its indelible mark on humans, fought and won for then. And here was another battle in that long-ago conflict.

58:18 But now, survival of the sisterhood was in the balance. How many technical specialists remained on Chapter House? She knew the answer without looking. Not enough. Odre leaned forward and keyed for transmit. Cyborg him, she said. Clairby lives, but his face is replaced with a metal mask, and his eyes are just two glittering silver balls.

58:44 Oh, that's pretty spooky.

58:46 Spooky? Maybe, but then again, perhaps it's just a part of the natural progression of humankind. Perhaps the merging of man and machine is the only logical future where we can extrapolate that humans can survive indefinitely. Anyway, organism, thanks for checking out my video. I'm gonna go upload it now.

59:06 See you later. Activate teleporter. Teleporting.

59:15 Fool. He's finally given me the key to destroy him. I can't outsmart Gwen's human mind to escape this dreaded place, but I can certainly hack his machine mine once I cyborg him.